New, in debt and desperate (LONG)

Hello,=0D
As with most young couples just starting out, my husband (at the time,
my boyfriend--then fiance) and I made some very foolish financial decisions
.
We got the credit/credit cards (I had excellent credit before we moved in
together because I always paid my bills on time--but I didn't have as many
bills to pay either because I lived with my parents), bought a few things
(some things we needed, some we didn't), maxed one of them out and then
consolidated. And at first, it wasn't so bad. We were getting them paid,
even if it was slowly. But, about 8 or 9 months ago everything started to
go to hell. I am going to go back a few months earlier than that tho. It'
s
going to be long, but I hope no one means. I have to get this out.=0D
=0D
My husband had left a job he had to go to work for another company with
better pay and better benefits. It was our meal ticket. It was going to
help us get our bills paid on time and get out of debt. Then it all came
tumbling down. The department he worked for contained a lot of immature
jerks who liked to give people a hard time. They had even run others off
the job who couldn't take their crap (sorry, pardon my language). Well, my
husband is the kind of guy who will put up w/ a lot. He doesn't usually le
t
things bother him. This bothered him. He filed harassment charges and tha
t
only made things worse. The managers even gave him a hard time about it.
So after 5 months of putting up w/ the bull, he quit, 2 weeks before
Christmas. It was bad timing, but I didn't blame him (also, is brother
still works for the same company, but he got himself transferred to another
state because they did the same crap to him).=0D
He got another job, almost 2 months later, but it was w/ a temp agency.

We had hopes that he would get hired by the company he was temping for, but
it never happened. He lost that job 2 months ago (a week before our
wedding). And up until May, I'd only been working part-time (I'm currently
a temp, but am in the process of getting hired by the company I'm temping
for--same one my husband was temping for, but a different dept). He has
been desperately looking for a job and we hope he finds one soon, but it's
all so stressful.=0D
So the debts are piling up. We tried to solve our debt problems one wa
y
by getting another credit card so we could consolidate again. Only, the
amount was so low that we can't consolidate on it (we're not using the card
at all, not for anything). With only myself working right now it's hard to
even keep the utilities paid much less the credit payments. I get paid
weekly and this week's check and next week's check all have to go towards
rent. We also have a car payment due, plus other bills.=0D
His parents have been a big help to us, and we are so grateful for it,
but we also feel bad about it. It hurts that we have had to rely on them s
o
much (even if they were the ones to offer the help). And of course, not
only do we have our bills to get paid off, we also have to pay them back
(which is the right thing to do). But, we cannot do both. There's just no
way. And it's getting to the point where making out the checks to pay our
bills puts me in a big depression.=0D
If we could go back 2 years and change all of this, we would. We would
not have been so foolish.=0D
So, now I get to the point of all this. We need to file bankruptcy.
Things are just getting deeper and deeper. My questions are, which kind
should we file for, can we file only on certain things (for example, we don
t want to file bankruptcy on our car, we want to continue to make payments
on it--we need the transportation too much), how much does it cost to file
(we live in Texas)? I think I have other questions too, but I'm tired and
cannot think of them. Any advice anyone can offer will be greatly
appreciated. We have no life now. We cannot afford to do anything and it'
s
hurting.=0D
=0D
Carin=0D
carin@sbcglobal.net